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Session 2793

Integrating Construction Engineering Planning Into a Structural Civil Engineering Program

David S. Cottrell, P.E., Ph. D. United States Army Corps of Engineers

Abstract

This paper describes the planning, design, and teaching of a new course in entitled “Construction Engineering Planning,” developed to augment the civil engineering curriculum at the US Military Academy with related topics in construction. This course effectively blended construction management principles – planning, organizing, staffing, directing, and controlling – with project engineering tenets of scope definition, budget development, and scheduling.

Introduction

This paper describes the development and implementation of a new course in construction engineering planning designed to augment the structural Civil Engineering program at the United States Military Academy at West Point. At USMA, all students take 31 common core courses, 16 of which are in the humanities. This substantial core curriculum leaves little room for the critical engineering topics necessary for maintaining viable, ABET-accredited engineering programs. In addition, students do not select their academic major until their sophomore year and generally are not able to take any engineering courses until the second semester of that year as shown in Figure 1. Thus addition of a construction management course was not generally considered a pragmatic option, although the educational benefit represented a potentially high dividend. The robust engineering program at West Point was superb in developing structural design engineers, but the practical side of civil engineering, defining the “how” in constructed facilities, was not part of the curriculum. This course in construction engineering planning aimed directly at producing construction management skills in the student that would reinforce the leadership and engineering instruction from other courses and subsequently prepare him for service as a civil engineer.

The Course Description, Implementation, and Student Response

This academic experiment ultimately resulted in a 3.0 credit hours course for senior engineering students dealing with the particulars of project management. The underlying foundation for the course grew from the premise that civil construction projects are essentially unique with each project engineer applying his or her own style of management.

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Cottrell, D. S. (2000, June), Integrating Construction Engineering Planning Into A Structural Civil Engineering Program Paper presented at 2000 Annual Conference, St. Louis, Missouri. 10.18260/1-2--8472